NHL agreement doesn't come soon enough, or do enough, to bring back this hockey fan

Details of the deal between the NHL and its players are trickling out this morning. And for those of us hard-core hockey fans who have closely followed this dog and pony show, I'm waiting for the something, anything, to help me understand why this took so long.

This is almost the exact same deal that was on the table the week prior to Christmas when the two sides met and the possibility of a 70-game regular season still existed.

View full sizeThe recently completed IIHF World Junior Championship, won by Team USA, was a substitute for hockey fans who missed watching the game on TV.NATHAN DENETTE, The Canadian Press

Did this really come down to a million or so dollars in the second year at the top end of the salary cap and a couple million at the bottom of the cap?

Please tell me the next time NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman and NHLPA hired gun Donald Fehr speak to us fans about the details of this deal, they can show us something that justified three extra months of posturing and bickering.

Just a guess here, but I'm pretty sure that will not happen. Forget Christmas, this deal could have easily been done in late October. There is nothing earth shattering that justifies nine extra weeks of cob webs in NHL rinks across North America.

As a fan of the game, I'm glad NHL hockey is going to drop the puck this season. But as a fan of the game, not just an NHL fan, this league can go pound sand.

I learned this late fall and winter I don't need the NHL to still love the game. The recently completed Junior World Championships was fantastic hockey. I have a son who plays, so in a twisted way his bantam travel team was filling a void.

More importantly I learned not to miss the NHL.

Please forgive me for not jumping up and down with joy over your last-second deal that was always going to happen instead of the entire season being wiped out.

I took a grass roots pledge started by some hard-core hockey fans on Facebook called Just Drop It. The premise is for every game they take after Dec. 21, we fans are taking one back.

No tickets, no merchandise and no watching on television.

Whatever that number is for my beloved Philadelphia Flyers, I'm going to honor and fulfill my pledge. Then I'm going to double it. And then, maybe, I'll consider watching a game.

Will this mean anything to the league that 20,000-something fans are trying to fight back? It won't even cause them to blink an eye. The bully is too big and strong for this jab from a small legion of loyal fans to have any impact.

It would be nice if they offered the NHL Center Ice television package to us for free or at a ridiculously cheap price like $1 a month including the playoffs as a way of thanking the fans. That would be a good first step.

This was the third work stoppage under Bettman in less than two decades. Each one I learned something about the league and how I feel about hockey as a fan.

This time I figured out I can remove the Flyers from my sports world and still get my hockey fix.

I love the game more than the league. To me this season is toast. The Stanley Cup winner will have an asterisk. I feel bad for the eventual winner. Even if it's my Flyers, it will still be a tainted victory lap down Broad Street.

It's exciting as a fan of the game to have the NHL back.

Wish I could say I was coming along for the ride this time. For how long I can't exactly say, and after reading some of the details of the deal this morning I'm even more ticked.

I still love the game. But I despise this league, players and owners alike, for what it's done to us the last six months.

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